Friday, 30 March 2012

If I'm shwe shwe, what does that make you?

So I've been a a bit incommunicado lately. Combine post-travel disorganization with work acceleration with crazy sickness, and things on the home front came to a standstill. I had a nice mod-ish shift dress cut and marked for the Sew Weekly Mad Men challenge, when I was floored by 10 days of fever, vomiting and pain. After about a week of that (plus one call to my boss, a parasitologist), my slow brain started to put the pieces together and think it could be malaria. Luckily two blood tests by my labmate and 4 hours at Trop. Med. ruled that out. Until I get the results of my blood tests back, the diagnosis is probably just a nasty virus combined with a severe case of motherhood. Whew.

During my fevered afternoons on the sofa, I caught up on a lot of blog reading and I started to think about how I associate certain people with certain fabrics. I know I talk about shwe shwe a lot (and I'm in the process of sewing something from a piece of double-sided shwe shwe I've been hoarding for more than a year), so that's me. What about you?

When I think of wool, I think of Debi. Hell, look at her photo from today: wool trousers!

http://fashionsfromthepast.blogspot.ca/

(I have a almost feral itchiness that comes over me if wool even comes within a few millimetres of my skin, so I avoid it at all costs, but Debi and her gorgeous vintage creations have convinced me that nothing can compare to wool for fall/winter wear. I have a deep purple piece of Italian gabardine from the thrift store that I may just have the courage to use by the time autumn rolls around....if I can find some purple lining.)

I can't imagine her posting a photo dressed in cheap synthetic! Every enviable sun drenched beach or eucalyptus forest photoshoot she posts features her cool creations. Like a breath of fresh air when we're knee deep in snow...

11 comments:

A woman in my sewing group is the queen of knits. No seriously, she has her own sewing business where she makes sports clothes for athletes. All it IS is knits! It's incredible what she does with them!

I really enjoyed this post! Because yeah, where the heck does Peter find these things. lol

Yup, well true I am very partial to linen! Shwe shwe? hmm, embarrassed to admit I've never heard of it, but I'm pretty sure you can't even get it here!! Thanks for the shout-out, and I hope you are feeling better soon.

I keep thinking, "someday when my kids are older and more independent, I'll have time to sew tailored linen things that are as beautiful inside as out, just like Carolyn does". ;) Or maybe they become more demanding of your time as they get older?!

I was almost 100% sure it wasn't, since I've been to Africa several times and don't even remember getting mosquito bites, but a colleague of mine was misdiagnosed several years ago at this centre and she developed cerebral malaria and died quite quickly. They are very thourough with the malaria testing now...

I'm on the lookout for coloured denim to make some capris, but I can't for the life of me find anything of quality around here. If I find some beige or white denim, I'm going to snap it up for dyeing.

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About Me

During the day, I am a mild mannered scientist. During the evenings and weekends, I am an exhausted mom. During my free time, I am teaching myself to sew. In other words, my house is a mess and we eat a lot of pasta.
Contact me at vicki_muise [at] yahoo [dot] ca if there's something too exciting / embarrassing / private to post as a comment.